The fall 2017 academic year featured the largest class of new students in EC’s history, according to the ten day numbers presentation given on Friday, Sept. 15 in Illinois Hall during the semester’s first faculty meeting.

The ten day numbers, the admission department’s report on the number of students enrolled in various departments, was delivered in the form of a lengthy presentation by Interim Dean of Admissions Tim Ricordati. The presentation compared the performance of the 2017 school year to that of previous years and tocompeting colleges.

Enrollment numbers at EC over the years, as presented on Friday, Sept. 17, showing 2017 as the largest group of incoming students in the history of the college. Graphic by Domenica Divietro

According to Ricordati’s presentation, the fall 2017 class boasted a total of 497 new first year students enrolled. His presentation also revealed other recruiting details, such as the 392 transfer students that were enrolled in fall 2017.

In addition to sharing these reports, Ricordati also set the guidelines to recruiting for the fall of 2018.

“We’re going to continue to refine our out-of-state recruiting plan,” he said. “We kind of started the out-of-state initiative last andwe’ve refined it to really look at areas like southwest Michigan, the Columbus area, Indianapolis, St. Louis and also Wisconsin.”

Ricordati then touched on his intention to further pursue the international recruitment efforts started last year.

“International recruiting really is a five-year process but it takes about three years. We saw some of the fruits of our labor this summer when we hosted about a dozen students from Vietnam to take Macroeconomics,” he said.

The meeting also addressed a number of other initiatives, most notably the change to the ECIC requirements for students whose first language is not English. The change came in the form of a motion brought up to the faculty, and effectively made English courses count as an accepted second language for ECIC’s foreign language proficiency test.

The motion was unanimously approved by the faculty.

Among other things addressed at the meeting was the looming discussion around the changing of the college’s name from Elmhurst College to University of Elmhurst. During his address that kicked off the meeting, EC President Troy VanAken addressed the name change as something that needed further discussion after some faculty expressed a desire to have a strong voice in the conversation.

“We do need to have a University of Elmhurst discussion. I know at the end of last year faculty asked that they be able to have some time to look at that and I totally respect that,” he said. “I know there are some concerns and some questions and we owe it to ourselves to have that conversation. And I’m glad that we’re taking some time and [not] doing it in a rush.”

“I still remain open on what’s best for Elmhurst and our discussion and ideas and debate should inform that. But I do want to have that conversation this semester.”